Telltale Games Enters Majority Closure, Walking Dead Finale Reportedly Cancelled

[Vayra86]

I know nothing about them treating their employees badly. Sorry. You're acting like this is common knowledge.

But I agree that they tried too much. I said that earlier as well.

Crunch mentality, 24/7 365 basically. Its far too common and if the initial success dies down, that's doing a lot of work for crappy results. People get demotivated, disgruntled and leave or they stay and barely do work. Basically that's what killed this studio. Bad management.

Its worth noting that CDPR is another such company that has elevated crunch time to 'standard operating procedure'. You should watch some interviews with ex CDPR devs about TW3... Its only their success that keeps the whole thing afloat because they can keep hiring replacements.

 

[StrayKAT]

Crunch mentality, 24/7 365 basically. Its far too common and if the initial success dies down, that's doing a lot of work for crappy results. People get demotivated, disgruntled and leave or they stay and barely do work. Basically that's what killed this studio. Bad management.

I didn't keep up with any news on them. Other than one particular writer. John Dombrow. He worked for Bioware and left after ME3 to work at TellTale. I think he was on the Game of Thrones team. But I thought it strange that he left fairly quickly and went back to Bioware. Maybe this is why (then again, EA itself doesn't have a better reputation in that respect. Their employees have filed lawsuits, if you recall. I'm sure they pay more though).

 

[FordGT90Concept]

March 16, 2017: Sources: Telltale CEO Steps Down

September 14, 2017: Former Zynga VP of games Pete Hawley named CEO of Telltale Games

November 7, 2017: Telltale Games lays off 90 employees

March 20, 2018: Toxic management cost an award-winning game studio its best developers

June 13, 2018: Exclusive: Netflix to bring Minecraft: Story Mode to service - but not traditional games

June 15, 2018: Former CEO and co-founder sues Telltale Games

September 21, 2018: Narrative Adventure Studio Telltale Games Essentially Closes Down

Canceled games in production:
-The Wolf Among Us: Season Two
-Game of Thrones: Season Two
-the untitled Stranger Things game
-The Walking Dead: The Final Season

 

[StrayKAT]

Seems things really went downhill when the CEO left.


Like them or not, it's terrible for all of us who wanted Walking Dead to finish. It sucks to have 2.1 Seasons finished and just lingering in your game library. Even if they're not the greatest games, it's still a great way of telling stories. When I was young, I liked those Choose Your Own Adventure books as much as I liked games. So it's cool to have this in interactive form.

 

[TheLaughingMan]

I think the main issue was high cost of high profile properties, complete lack of marketing, and production issues. You can't drop that kind of money on your title licenses, they not tell customers the games exist ( literally just learned about 6 games they have that I never knew existed), and then be a terrible place to work on top of that.

 

[neatfeatguy]

Shame, my younger brother loves these adventure games TTG puts out. He's got them all - aside from maybe the Batman one. He's going to be pissed the Walking Dead one won't be finished and the other entry for Wolf Among Us won't come out.....plus the Borderlands one that he was really looking forward to.

I really liked the Back To The Future game they put out. I hadn't played a point and click adventure game since the original Sam & Max and Full Throttle days. Never really my thing, but BTTF was a pretty decent game if you're a fan of the movies.

 

[Totally]

I think the main issue was high cost of high profile properties, complete lack of marketing, and production issues. You can't drop that kind of money on your title licenses, they not tell customers the games exist ( literally just learned about 6 games they have that I never knew existed), and then be a terrible place to work on top of that.

Yep, can't sell a product to someone who doesn't know it exists. But I have to ask how do you target gamer's nowadays. I'm very atypical, I don't watch television, don't really the social media thing, and no longer read gaming mags or visit site as the I find the former archaic and latter too frivolous with content to bother with. To sum it up I'm pretty out of touch.

 

[DeathtoGnomes]

They made a couple nice games but not all of them were good. I refused to buy anymore when they decided to use the console UI controls for PC versions, which made the games a bit clumsy and ruined my experiences with them.

 

[CandymanGR]

This is what happens if you offer the exact same game mechanics with the fake illusion of choice, in your every game. Walking Dead 1 was good. After that everything slowly declined. Thats my opinion.

 

[DeathtoGnomes]

This is what happens if you offer the exact same game mechanics with the fake illusion of choice, in your every game. Walking Dead 1 was good. After that everything slowly declined. Thats my opinion.

lets not mention the "oh shit I'm stupid" graphics that equated to stop motion blurr-ography.

 

[StrayKAT]

lets not mention the "oh shit I'm stupid" graphics that equated to stop motion blurr-ography.

I'm drawing a blank on what you mean. Any examples?

 

[DeathtoGnomes]

I'm drawing a blank on what you mean. Any examples?

Sorry no.

 

[Upgrayedd]

TellTale is like the Funko of gaming but without the sales lol

 

[StrayKAT]

Sorry no.

Denied.



You guys aren't wrong though about the poor gameplay. I'd prefer both dynamic story and gameplay.. But it's hard enough to even find that done well very often now too.

Looks like mods deleted by silly link to a Machinima vid. I considered it a good tribute. Oh well.

 

[Readlight]

Global economic crisis in midle clas, rich people read book, and many now, how videogames impact there live. Videogames are not anymore something new and exsaiting.

 

[BorisDG]

I waited for this for a long time. The company was crap anyways. Their "games" had zero gameplay, full with quicktime events... and the lack of innovation or progress even in tech.

Good news at the end.

 

[Disparia]

Not a style that would draw me in by itself but alongside reading/watching Game Of Thrones I also played the Telltales series and was entertained enough by the installments.

 

[Solaris17]

I waited for this for a long time. The company was crap anyways. Their "games" had zero gameplay, full with quicktime events... and the lack of innovation or progress even in tech.

Good news at the end.

I cant personally attest to this studio being a good or bad one, but I do agree to some extent. I think layoffs are always bad but I'm a bit sad this seemed to be such a slow death (or maybe it isnt in the studio industry?) best that those people get the opportunity to go find other jobs. If the studio sucked. Instead of putting there energy into trying to save a sinking ship (management issues).

I dont hate on small studios though Hellblade: Senuas Sacrifice was a work of art and their video editor got the role of senua by mistake because they needed a tester.

 

[rtwjunkie]

I waited for this for a long time. The company was crap anyways. Their "games" had zero gameplay, full with quicktime events... and the lack of innovation or progress even in tech.

Good news at the end.

As with ANY studio, some sucked, some were good. Either Story Adventure games are completely not your style (which is ok, but doesn’t mean they all sucked), or you didn’t play them all.

At least one of their games, which most who know them have played is considered excellent.

 

[StrayKAT]

To be fair, original Adventure games had plenty of gameplay too. Mostly puzzles. TellTale didn't even do much of that. But I did enjoy the storytelling. They simply spread themselves too thin. And they definitely should have finished Walking Dead like... yesterday. Lee shouldn't have died for this crap. lol

 

[FordGT90Concept]

I played most of them and the only one I didn't like was Game of Thrones. It might be something people that watched the series would appreciate but gamers looking for fun (like me) won't. I didn't care for Walking Dead either but I can at least appreciate that other people would like it (I vote "meh" for all zombie-themed games). Sam & Max, Puzzle Agent, Minecraft: Story Mode, Tales from the Borderlands, Poker Night at the Inventory, Back to the Future, Wolf Among Us, Batman Telltale Series, Hector: Badge of Carnage (just published), and Strong Bad were all good. That's a stronger-than-average track record.

 

[rtwjunkie]

To be fair, original Adventure games had plenty of gameplay too. Mostly puzzles

Of course...I’m also a normal Adventure game player. That’s why I specified that “Story Adventure” games might not be his thing.

 

[FordGT90Concept]

To be fair, original Adventure games had plenty of gameplay too. Mostly puzzles. TellTale didn't even do much of that. But I did enjoy the storytelling. They simply spread themselves too thin. And they definitely should have finished Walking Dead like... yesterday. Lee shouldn't have died for this crap. lol

The internet killed puzzle games. Balancing them is always impossible because everyone is different in that regard. The only way to fool the internet is to randomize the puzzle but what if it is genuinely too difficult for the player and the puzzle becomes blocking/game breaking? That tees up a negative review. Telltale gravitated away from puzzle games as most of the industry did.

Also, it was never about Lee. He's a convict with a death sentence. The game makes that abundantly clear from the first few minutes.

 

[StrayKAT]

Of course...I’m also a normal Adventure game player. That’s why I specified that “Story Adventure” games might not be his thing.

Oh, I thought you meant the same thing.

In any case, I kind of see TellTale like Bioware games... without the RPG mechanics. Heh. So not even like old Adventure games either. If that's what "Story Adventure" is, cool.. I never heard it used before.

 

[FordGT90Concept]

Telltale Games, for the last decade, made high-production visual novels. Take away the 3D rendering and the action scenes that suck players into the character and a visual novel is all that's left.